Pin Light

^^hough Pin Light, like Vivid Light and Linear Light, is a contrast-increasing blending mode, it behaves slightly differently. While you can use Pin Light for boosting contrast, because in effect Pin Light is a combination of the Darken and Lighten modes, it is more suited to creating special effects.

KEYBOARD SHORTCUT

Windows: Alt+Shift+Z Mac: Option+Shift+Z

Using Pin Light

We can pass quickly over simple Pin Light self-blends, as applying them has no result Even if you apply Gaussian blur, there's little or no effect on the picture The fun begins when you start inverting the layer

Only after inverting and blurring the Pin Light layer do you begin to get some appealing results.

Layers Channels -I Paths

Pin Light

V

Opacity:

100%

►

Lock: Q J £ Fill:

100%

Invert + blur 10

Background a

Layers Channels \ Paths

Pin Light

Opacity:

100%

>

Lock: □ _y Q Fill:

100%

►

Channel:

Channel:

Output: q

Cancel

Smooth

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Use a Curves adjustment layer to make an inverted self-blend.This method results in a much smaller file size than creating an inverted copy of the original.

Pin Light and Find Edges

You could create a self-blend with an inverted copy, but remember you can make a self-blend using a Curves adjustment layer Create the Curves adjustment layer, simply drag the curve's bottom end to the top left, and then drag the curve's top end down to the bottom right and click OK The effect is the same as using an inverted image layer, but the resulting file takes up much less disk space If you want, you can revisit the curve at any time and produce all sorts of tonal reversals

Channel: GB

Channel: GB

Input:

Output 228

Input:

Output 228

Smooth

0 Preview

E5&

Once you add a Curves layer, there's nothing to stop you experimenting with the curve.

Pin Light can be used to create a fun, colored, line-drawing effect Other blending modes such as Multiply can darken the image, but of all the contrast-increasing modes, Pin Light will produce the most natural result

1 Duplicate the image layer and apply Filter > Stylize > Find Edges

2 Desaturate the Find Edges layer (Ctrl/Cmd-Shift-U)

3 Apply a Levels or Curves adjustment to fine-tune the line drawing's strength

4 Duplicate the image layer again, and drag the Find Edges and Desaturated layer to the middle

5 Switch the top layer's blending mode to Pin Light Try inverting the blend layer and reducing the opacity until you're happy with the results

A colored line-drawing effect can be achieved easily with a gently blurred Pin Light layer.